common art

Wednesdays, from 8am - 2pm at Emmanuel Church (15 Newbury St.)

To create together:

This weekly art program offers space, art materials, and supportive relationships to encourage individuals experiencing homelessness and poverty to learn, engage, and connect in community. common art promotes access to the arts by providing opportunities and resources that facilitate creative expression.

Those who live in shelters, rooming houses, on unclaimed couches and benches, and on Boston's streets, gather together each week, with our partner, Emmanuel Church, to draw, paint, bead, sculpt, and share their artistic talents.

As soul medicine:

As Shaun McNiff of Lesley College expressed in his book Art as Medicine, "Whenever illness is associated with loss of soul, the arts emerge spontaneously as remedies, as soul medicine."

For some members, art is a professional path, an opportunity to express invisible truths, a joyful oasis of form and color in dry times, a simple, welcome relief from daily difficulty, or a new discovery of imaginative possibility. In common art community, art is a way of life - a defiant or gentle "yes" in the face of stigma amid the constant struggle of poverty and homelessness.

Lasting committment:

common art began in 1999 by a group of un-housed men and women with the assistance of ministers from St. John the Evangelist Church on Bowdoin Street. As a unique opportunity within the city of Boston, one participant expressed, "common art is famous! Everybody knows about it on the street!"

By acknowledging the dignity of all human beings and honoring the divine creativity within each person, through proactive advocacy, common art provides companionship and inclusive community - a place to come together and to share with other artists. common art continues to embrace all artistic expression as healing and healthful - affirming of life itself!

Art shows and exhibitions:

common art members have exhibited their work together and individually in Boston's art and faith communities since 2001, including an exhibition staged at the Massachusetts State House in March 2003 and again in 2013, and at the United Nations in 2014.

Our artists are eager to exhibit their work in churches, public buildings (libraries, cafes, other places of business and industry). Please click here if you are interested in supporting such an exhibit.

Check out our Fall 2022 virtual art gallery, “Hope in the Unseen,” made in collaboration with Unbound Visual Arts: https://artspaces.kunstmatrix.com/en/exhibition/10745749/common-art-hope-in-the-unseen

Our partners:

common art is currently, lovingly in support with:

• Rachael Oluokun of Mama O’s Bakery in Ashland, MA

• Jeanie Gruber of Wish Dish in Stow, MA